By Tami Buchanan
Back in the old days, kitchens were very old fashioned. They only had a sink and that was pretty much it. I'm talking about a long time ago, of course. About a century or more. Today, we have so many appliances to help us out with all of our chores in the kitchen. A long time ago, people didn't have any appliances at all. The very first dishwasher was invented in the 19th century.
The invention of the dishwasher has come from a woman named Josephine Cochran. She was a very wealthy society matron from Illinois. Next to that, she was also an inventor. Ms. Cochran has hosted many dinner parties to show off her first few models. The first ones were hand operated. Her staff had a much easier time washing the dishes thanks to these machines.
Josephine Cochran didn't just start building those dishwashers before she had given them a lot of thought. She had measures the sizes of her plates and her cups and then made compartments in which they fit perfectly. The compartments would then be placed in a wheel. A copper boiler with hot water would hold the wheel.
By manually turning the wheel, the hot and soapy water from the boiler would be set into motion. It would squirt up and when it came down it went through the compartments in the wheel. This made the dishes clean. Hotels and restaurants quickly got wind of this marvelous machine, so Ms. Cochran patented it and started producing dishwashers commercially.
Many decades later, in the 1920s, plumbing became a modern day features of the dishwasher machine. Yet two decades later, engineers added electric drying elements to it. The technology kept on improving in the following decades and the dishwasher became commonplace in kitchen worldwide in the 1970s.
Another appliance that goes a long way back, is the refrigerator. The fridge was invented by a German engineer named Carl von Linde. He came up with the technology required to keep things cool. Without that, refrigerators simply wouldn't be possible. The patent for his cooling technology dates back to the late 19th century. A few decades later, in the 1920s, lots of companies were producing fridges commercially.
It took some time before the fridge managed to get a foothold in people's kitchens. In the late 1930s, only a small fraction of the US population had purchased a fridge. By the time the 1950s, a vast majority of homes were the proud owners of a fridge. Nowadays, of course, nearly everybody owns one.
We are living in a very modern era where a kitchen full of large kitchen appliances is the norm. We are used to having the water and the electricity we need delivered straight to our homes whenever we need them. There was a period in time where this was not the case. Instead of taking our kitchen appliances for granted, we should take the time to think about how it used to be, so we can feel grateful!
In case you have enjoyed this post, I advise you also check out
Cuisinart TOB195 Convection Toaster Review. For a larger collection of editorials, pay a visit to
Small Kitchen Appliances.
By Frank Webb
